Know your farmer, know your food
On the front of our team t-shirts is our name, FOLO: Feed Our Loved Ones. On the back, we printed the phrase "Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food". We may (or may not) have invented the phrase, but it's a philosophy that resonates deeply with us.
We are a family farm, started by 6 families, including our Chief Farmer's. We call him Shifu (师父) Ah Lek, and he works together with his team of formidable farmers to bring pesticide-free, nutrient-rich harvests to our members weekly. This is the team on the ground daily, toiling under the hot sun, tweaking the compost, catching bugs by hand, without whom there would be no FOLO veggies.
They are all rather shy, and tend to be in the background during open farm days, so we thought we would bring their faces to you :)
Shifu (师父) and Shimu (师母). Shimu is really camera-shy, and this was the maximum exposure she would give us :D Shifu is, well, Shifu. He grows ginormous veggies.
Yoyok. Our senior farmer who is mostly at Ban Foo (our production farm), caring for the veggies day to day. He has worked with Shifu for a long time, before FOLO was born.
Gito. Our charming compost maker and all rounder. He's mainly at Ban Foo too, and is always nagging at us to design a FOLO hat.
Handsome. He manages Kempas (our show farm) and helps Wong with our DIY projects. He likes to joke around, but is very serious about growing big beautiful veggies at Kempas.
Tam (left) and Young (right). This husband and wife pair are from Myanmar. Tam is quietly cheeky and has a special talent for catching flea beetles. Young is our only female farmer, very shy but smiley!
Team photo at Ban Foo. Standing on the left is our super DIY man Johnny Wong. He can make anything. Seriously. From unsexy water tank shelves to delicately pretty wire bonsai, he's such a genius that we made a short video clip of him.
And our first FOLO interns, Ben and Rebecca:
Ben is studying to be a chef. During his month with us, he was involved in composting, cooking our weekly team lunches, and experimenting with making different vegetable fermentations. As you can see, he has a particular fondness for compost and chicks. Ben has since gone back to school. Do come back soon Ben!
Here's Rebecca, tackling the unruly pandan leaves with 100% calmness. She joined us for a month, and has now gone back to South Africa to pursue her passion in fashion design. Her dream is to be a change-maker in the world of fashion, bringing sustainable materials to the forefront of fashion. All the best Rebecca!
Cheers,
The FOLO Team
